Shabbat service times

[cellio]

Does this happen in other cities too? Can anyone explain why?

This week our main service (at 8:00) is mildly unappealing, so I thought to look for options. (That's fine.) My congregation also has a 6:00 service, but Shabbat right now starts around 7:30, so I'd rather find one a little later. The congregation where I go for weekdays has their Friday servies at 5:45 every week (save one per month). There's a newish (traditional egalitarian, unaffiliated) congregation in town I've never been to, so I looked them up -- also 5:45. Ok, what about the traditional (non-egalitarian) shul just down the street that I've been curious about? 6:30 -- ok, that's closer, but still a little surprising. Most of the explicitly-Orthodox congregations don't publish times (presumably it's candle-lighting time, give or take five minutes).

I'm surprised by the number of congregations that are doing services that far in advance of sunset. Reform congregations do not tend to feel as time-bound, so that doesn't surprise me, but I expected Conservative and "traditional" congregations to follow the sun. So do people in these congregations just add time to their Shabbat? I know you're allowed to start Shabbat early, but adding a couple hours (more in summer) is not always what you want to do. Or is the model that you go to services and get home before candle-lighting (which means you can drive, which makes the time hit less)? That feels odd too -- either you're doing the kabbalat shabbat service but not actually accepting Shabbat, or you're just doing mincha and going home, not doing a Shabbat service in community.

I do realize that in more traditional congregations the model is that the men go to services while the women stay home and prepare dinner. That's a model that doesn't work so well for a woman who prepares dinner (before Shabbat, of course) and goes to services. But I don't think that's all of it. Do the men in these congregations get home from work on Friday in time to prepare for Shabbat, walk to shul, and start a service two hours early, without being rushed or cutting out of work earlier than they would otherwise? Do they go to shul on their way home from work (and you just have to have done all your Shabbat prep that morning)? Something else?

Some of the congregations that have early services say they do it to make it easier for families with young kids to attend. That would argue against the "the men go and the women don't" model, but it still seems challenging to me. But then, I don't have kids.

Any other ideas for what might be going on here?

Comments

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

Our shul has a 7pm cap on Friday mincha. So even when mincha is later than that the rest of the week, it will never be later than 7pm on Friday (except if Pesach or Shavuot are involved). And arvit follows immediately on the heels of mincha. Yes, that means bringing Shabbat in an hour early (or even more than that). And it means repeating kriyat sh'ma after dinner. But otherwise dinner would be way too late.

[msmemory.livejournal.com]

The one observant man at my small company does leave very early on Fridays (in winter, by 3 pm).

[mbarr.livejournal.com]

For shul's where they actually expect most people to keep shabbos:

In the summer, most shuls up here start at 7. Some of them have 2 services - 7 & the sun tracking. The 7 one is so that people can get home and actually have time before it's too late for kids to be up. Dinner is after shul, and that doesn't presuppose a spouse at home.

Yes, you end up w/a longer shabbos. But in the winter, we end up w/ a much shorter day on Friday, anyways, so you just leave work early enough to prep before shul.

As for other shuls: 5:30 does allow for people to come to shul, go home, and then have dinner, while still at a reasonable time. Having a late service is even more strange to us then an early one, at this point. 8pm in the winter means that they expect you to have dinner before shul, and have to rush through dinner to get to shul on time. There aren't many families that will have a nice family dinner after shul is over at 9pm. (It only works in certain places in the summer, where the younger folks w/o families don't mind starting dinner that late. We appreciate the option to work a full day and not have to rush home...)

[ichur72.livejournal.com]

FWIW, this is what we do in my (Orthodox) congregation. Once DST starts, there are 2 Friday services. There's an early minyan that starts davening minchah close to the earliest permissible time (plag haminchah*), and then a later minyan that starts shortly before the actual time of sunset.

When I lived in Dallas, the shul I attended had only one Friday night minyan, and it never started before 7:30 during the summer. I think they chose that time because it was reasonably early (relatively, anyway) but never fell before plag haminchah.

* More info on that here, if you want.